UK production company Envision Entertainment and Japanese broadcaster Nippon TV have announced a new scripted crime drama format titled ‘Connected’. It is the first project to result from their co-production partnership.

The two firms struck a deal last year that will see creators from both companies working together on content that will “combine their Western and Eastern sensibilities” for the global market.

‘Connected’ will combine both online screens and conventional single-camera setups unfolding in a shared universe where characters from all over the world are ‘connected’ to each other through the internet using their superior online research skills to solve crimes, the company said in a statement.

The international sleuths form an exclusive online community known as Homebound Detectives, working primarily from their homes, whether it is in London, Seoul or Berlin, with their problems, stories and mysteries to tackle.

The series has been specifically designed to expand to several localized versions, featuring diverse characters from different countries, while all belonging to the same shared online universe.

The Japanese version of ‘Connected’ will air in Japan on Nippon TV in April 2022 and features a twenty-something-year-old Homebound Detective in Tokyo struggling to solve a crime with the help of his international online peers.

Envision Entertainment and Nippon TV are simultaneously in advanced development for a UK version of ‘Connected’ which is set in the same shared universe.

Sayako Aoki, business producer, international business development, at Nippon TV said, “What we believe is strong about ‘Connected ‘is its relatability you may see in young fresh heroes and their struggles, not necessarily charismatic but charming, and that is how these multilayered and globally expanding stories are told through the online and offline world just like how we experience these days.”

Michael Nakan, CCO of Envision Entertainment said, “Our unique approach to hybrid communication between characters is a million miles away from forced ‘Europudding’ co-productions and offers a genuinely seamless opportunity to tell stories with local resonance and international scale.”